Traditionally, mower decks consist of front and rear baffles designed to create a smooth flow of grass cuttings suspended in air flow streams created by the blades within the mower housing, through the throat area and out the discharge. Arguably, these designs still suffer from the undesirable problems of buildup, clumping, and clogging of grass clippings within the mower housing. Mower housings are predisposed to these problems in large part as a result of stalled or non-unidirectional air flow streams within the mower housing and air turbulence generated at blade intersection points. Therefore, there is a need for a mower deck having separate wraparound baffles for each blade adapted to generate unidirectional air flow streams for efficiently discharging grass clippings and to prevent turbulence at blade intersection points.
A full wraparound baffle would prevent turbulence at blade intersection points and where air flow streams traveling in counter directions between the various sets of blades collide to disrupt the overall suspension and discharge of clippings, but would not allow discharge of grass clippings from the mower deck. Therefore, there is a need to provide a wraparound baffle having a sloped wall portion that decreases in height from the height of the wraparound baffle and terminates in the throat area to facilitate discharge of grass clippings, prevent turbulence from being generated at blade tip intersection points and prohibit conflicting air stream flows between and around the blades, within the baffles and/or through the throat and out the discharge opening.
Traditional mower decks also have a spindle extending through the top wall of the mower deck which is attached to the blade for the purpose of imparting rotation to the blade. The space proximate the spindle, between the blade and top wall, is predisposed to vortices, stalling and disruption of air flow streams, which causes grass clipping buildup. Stalled air streams around the spindle contribute to airflow boundary problems between the stalled air streams near the spindle and more fluid air streams farther away from the spindle. Therefore, there is a need to provide a collar around the spindle attached to the blade to occupy the area proximate the spindle being predisposed to high turbulence, vortices and stalled air streams to prevent clogging, buildup and air flow interruptions around the spindle.
Over time, mower decks have been designed with versatility in mind by providing decks and blade designs that could operate in a side discharge mode or mulching mode. Although these mowers allow the user to quickly switch between side discharge and mulching, the baffles used to complete the conversion fail to optimize the full potential of both modes and in fact, often hinder the performance and intended operation of one or both of these modes due to inadequate considerations given to turbulence issues, such as air flow conflicts between blades, at blade intersection points or around the blade/spindle. Therefore, there is a need to provide a removable mulching baffle for closing off the opening in the wraparound baffle which can be quickly removed and reattached to convert the deck between discharge and mulching configurations. There is a further need to provide a mulching configuration that exhibits increased suction, better cutting, enhanced mulching, better suspension of grass clippings, and limited turbulence between blades, at blade intersection points or around the blade/spindle.